Dental Floss
by Webster
Summary: After "Jump the Shark," the cuts on Sam's arms refuse to heal.  Why is that?  Hurt!Sam and some proper Season 4 angst.


Adam Milligan's pyre burned swiftly and cleanly. Burning bodies was one thing the Winchesters knew how to do.

Before it burned down all the way, however, Sam staggered and leaned against a tree trunk.

"Sam?"

"Just got dizzy all of a sudden. I-" Sam broke off, looking at the blood dripping from his fingers.

Dean grabbed his wrist. "Dammit, Sammy." Dean pulled off the jacket and pushed up Sam's sleeve. The bandages were soaked with blood. Rather than expose the wound to the grave dirt staining his hands, Dean just added a new and tighter layer of gauze over what was already there. He hustled Sam back into the car, then recovered the tools.

The pyre could burn down alone. The forest was too damp to catch, after all.

Dean hustled him through the door of the motel and into the bathroom. He sat Sam down on the edge of the tub, scrubbed his hands, then began unwrapping Sam's wound, pulling away layer after layer of blood-soaked gauze.

"Where are the stitches? I sewed this up last night, and now it's wide open again. Did you burst them?"

Sam looked down at his arm in surprise

"What happened?" Dean asked again.

Sam set his jaw.

"You know what? Fine. Don't tell me."

With perhaps a bit more force than was really necessary, Dean replaced the first suture.

For the second time that day, Sam sat in the bathtub, arm hanging out. His face was dead white and his head flopped back against the bathroom wall. A deep black bruise decorated one temple, and both wrists had purpled impressively where the restraints bit in.

"What the hell is up with you? I put in new stitches four hours ago, and now they're gone again. They didn't burst, Sam. They're just gone. And even without them, the wounds should have started to heal by now."

Sam turned to look at him. "I don't know," he replied levelly.

"And how bad the bruises are? That just ain't normal." Dean shook his head. This time, he wrapped it tightly without restitching and left it propped on a pile of pillows.

"I'll be back," he announced. "Don't go anywhere."

Sam raised his head and glared, but dizziness quickly pulled it back down.

_It's the demon blood, Dean. It's running through my veins so thick it dissolves thread._

Not half an hour later, the motel door flew open and Dean burst through, carrying a shopping bag.

"I called Bobby. He says it's the ghoul saliva. Apparently it's an anticoagulant, among other things. Some waxed dental floss should hold the wounds closed long enough to heal."

"That's the arm it kept licking," Sam added slowly. "That makes sense."

Once the arm was restitched and covered in fresh gauze, Dean looked at his brother closely. "You've lost too much blood. I can barely feel the pulse in your other wrist, and I think you're going to faint if you try to stand up. You really should have a transfusion, but if I bring you in with those cuts, they'll think you tried to off yourself, and you're too big to smuggle out of the psych ward under my coat."

With the wound closed for the third time, Dean helped him out of the tub and into bed, keeping Sam's head low. Once Sam was settled and his eyes refocused, Dean reached for the shopping bag again.

"I got one other thing, too." Dean pulled out giant bundle of leaves.

"You bought vegetables?" Sam stared.

"Antitoxin. Vitamin K is the best way to get you clotting again. Grocery store didn't have vitamin pills, and the health food store is closed until tomorrow, but this cashier told me kale was the next best thing. And you love all that green stuff, right?"

"Ah, Dean? People don't usually eat raw kale."

"Dude, normal people don't eat friggin' kale. Microwave?" Dean suggested, stuffing a fistful of leaves into a coffee cup.

The first batch came out a little overdone, and Dean didn't have any garlic or oil to flavor it with. Still, Sam managed to get down about half a cup of cooked leaves, which would hopefully start to counteract the ghoul poison. Along with the bland, limp heap of greens, Dean pushed a full quart of apple juice into him, trying to make up for the frightening amount of blood that had washed down the drain.

Still, without a transfusion it would take a while for Sam to get his strength back. Time, those veggies he was so fond of, and, absolutely, DVDs. Dean didn't particularly want to talk about the whole Adam mess, but it had been months since the Winchesters had even seen a movie together, and the thought of spending a few days stuck in one spot didn't quite sound as boring as it usually did.


End file.
